Orange County NC Website
Browse       Search
<br />No time savings or road design delay in a <br />redesign based on Plan #3 <br />Site was purchased with intent of park in <br />the southern portion (initial evaluations <br />for purchase) <br />Some areas for future development exist to <br />east, southeast and possibly northwest <br />that would be closer to schools campus in <br />Designs #1 and #2 <br />As such, a key question is whether a redesign based on Plan #3 would yield a master <br />plan that includes the planned park facilities in the previous designs, <br />Staff's initial reading of Plan #3 appears to indicate that some park facilities would be <br />difficult, if not impossible to design on the northern portion of the site. The footprint of <br />these facilities are quite different from those of the schools, and some uses may not fit. <br />However, it is not possible to truly answer this question without going back to the <br />starting point of much of the design work of 2002-03 - the site analysis map. <br />Undertaking a thorough and comprehensive redesign based on the principles of Plan #3 <br />would not quite necessitate "going back to the drawing board," but it would require a <br />trip back to the earlier site analysis stage of the project, where the land's natural and <br />cultural resource constraints and opportunities were assessed Using that information, <br />and looking at it through the lens of a redesign option such as that proposed for Plan #3, <br />one would be able to fully assess important considerations - such as whether playing <br />fields could in fact be relocated as proposed, how traffic patterns might change, what the <br />impacts on stream buffer and stormwater design would be, among other issues, <br />As noted below, such an approach would take staff resources from ERCD, Recreation <br />and Parks, Planning, and the County Engineer. With many parks projects already <br />underway in different phases at this point in time, such an effort would draw staff resotnzes <br />away from efforts like Efland-Cheeks Phase.2, Northern Park andplans for Fairview Park in the spring <br />and fall of thisyea-. If other park design projects were put on hold for a comprehensive look <br />at whether a redesign based on Plan #3 could be done, staff estimates that time needed <br />would be 60 days from inception. if this effort were undertaken with the existing <br />projects continuing as scheduled, staff estimates this assessment of a possible redesign <br />would take 120 days (not including public meetings and public input processes). This <br />does not include any subsequent redesign, only the assessment of whether it could be <br />done. <br />Taking this into account, there a number of different options that could be pursued. <br />Three such options are identified below by staff, ranging from least time- <br />intensive/complexity to most time-intensive/complexity: